Miller, though, quickly thought better of the tweet and deleted it. He also apologized for the passionate reply. In a Politico blog post, Miller attacked Paul’s “spin.”

“I replied from my personal account to what I felt was spin after Senator Paul said factually incorrect things about vaccines,” Miller said. “It would’ve been better to respond with facts than an obscenity, and I deleted the tweet so it wouldn’t reflect on the Beast. I’m sorry for the insult.”

All this comes as the media are awash in stories about the efficacy of vaccination in the wake of an outbreak of measles introduced into the U.S. by a foreign visitor. Measles had previously been eradicated from the country.